


The Other Side Of The End

by hellokarma (pandapop)



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: And Lots of It, Angst, Aziraphale is Bad at Feelings (Good Omens), Crowley is Bad at Feelings (Good Omens), Eventual Happy Ending, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pining, Post-Canon, Rating May Change, Repression, Slow Burn, Some Fluff, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Weird Plot Shit, action stuff i guess, author heard of s2 possibility and got ahead of herself, everyone's bad at feelings okay and i mean EVERYONE, like seriously slow burn these idiots have issues, on Crowley's part anyway, the world's ending again but this time it's more dramatic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2020-09-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:34:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26361226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pandapop/pseuds/hellokarma
Summary: The end had been nigh, and the final day of judgement should have descended on the whole human race eight years ago. Salvation had come in strange and unexpected forms; an Angel, and a Demon, who had misplaced the antichrist, and, miraculously, made it out of the other side of the end relatively unscathed.Now, if only they’d realized sooner, that the antichrist had yet to grow up.Or; Eight years after the world didn’t end, Adam gets kidnapped, Heaven and Hell have made an Arrangement of their own, two new faces from both sides make appearances, and an angel and a demon who have unresolved issues stewing between them—six thousand years in the making—have to set it all aside once more to save humanity from the second coming of the antichrist.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Kudos: 3





	The Other Side Of The End

**Author's Note:**

> I've been mulling over this plot bunny for months and am now finally posting it! This is most definitely a WIP, but I have a few chapters already written out. For now I'm just posting this to see how it turns out :)

The room was grey.

It was the kind of grey that was a shade darker than it was light, casting the room in a touch of gloom. Even the mental health adverts on the wall and the bright light coming off of the lamp beside her chair did nothing to lessen the drab and monotonous tone the space had going for it.

Her little clock ticked loudly, filling the silence they had fallen into.

Adam hated it.

He hated all of it. The silence, and all the grey, knowing how it went beyond this room. He hated knowing he’d still see it on the pavement as he walked home, or in the sky that loomed over Tadfield in the past month, or in the clothes he’d worn to the funeral still hanging off of his bedroom door.

He hated seeing it in his mother’s eyes, the life of them losing colour with each passing month, not getting any closer to losing her grief.

“Adam,”

Adam startled, looking up at her, the light casting a shadow over her calm and aged face. The ticking kept going.

“Can you breathe for me, dear? Slowly.”

Adam did as she said.

She didn’t really ask him questions like he thought most therapists did—instead she gave him little instructions, like telling him to fix his shirt or drink the glass of water she set beside his chair...or breathe. She made him do that a lot, breathing. It’s all they seemed to do in the months he spent under her care.

After a few more minutes, Adam blinked in confusion. The clock usually stopped ticking by now.

“Should I keep going?” He asked, unsure. She gave him a little smile.

She never did that before, too. He almost thought he imagined it.

“Are you feeling calmer now?”

Adam kept evening his breaths. “Yes.”

“That’s good Adam. Very good,” She picked up the clock, the smile staying. Adam didn’t think one could stutter from breathing, but it felt like that’s what just happened. “It has been quite the year for you, hasn’t it? Exactly one year, in fact, since you’ve first entered my office.”

Oh. Adam didn’t think it was such an occasion. “That’s...” _Nice? Weird? A little bit sad, actually?_ Well, of course it is. The bloody anniversary was just last week.

“ _Wonderful_ , Adam. It’s quite the feat you know. You’ve come to every single session—a lot of patients quit before they even come to see me.” She finished for him, the light catching the rim of her glasses, glinting off of them. “You should be proud of yourself, dear boy,”

Adam looked down at his lap, not sure whether that’s an instruction he can follow.

She seemed to sense this, because she continued. “You know...for the antichrist, you are quite the good lad.”

Adam stiffened, his breaths pausing with him.

“I-I thought we didn’t have to talk about that,”

“Well, you wouldn’t have told me right off the bat if you truly didn’t want to talk about it at some point, did you?” Her voice was so gentle that Adam nearly calmed down again. Nearly. “Did you not want to talk about it?”

“It’s bollocks,”

“Language,”

“No, really. I was, what, eighteen? When I first came here? And you know, my dad died, so really I would’ve been just spouting nonsense y’know? Don’t know why I brought it up! I’m _mad_. I can’t even get an actual therapist to look after me, no offense. But seriously,” Adam rubbed a hand over his face, trying to even the breaths he’d lost during his rant. “It wasn’t, it probably was all just. A stupid dream. Nobody seemed to remember it, or care. Not that I’d know. My—“ He paused, teeth gritting. “—f-friends, at the time. They’re not here anymore. So it probably all wasn’t real. We should forget about it. I’ll just end up convincing myself that I do need to get a psychiatrist after all.”

She didn’t move, or even showed any indication that there was emotion on her face. At least, for a bit.

“You know that I believe you, Adam, don’t you?”

“...yeah, I know.” He didn’t know, if she was telling the truth that is, or if she was really just humouring him. He told her that first session, who he had been. What he _wasn’t_ anymore. He still doesn’t know why, but it felt like the thing to do at the time, and even then, she just nodded along and listened to him tell his, admittedly, downright _maddening_ story. He completely expected her to throw him into an asylum at one point, thinking she was just on the verge of calling the cops on him—but she didn’t, then, she never did. She just listened.

She hadn’t been fazed—like she already knew. If Adam really thought about it, it’s why he kept coming to her sessions. She never brought it up on her own.

Adam didn’t know why she was bringing it up _now_.

She still held the ticking clock in her hand. It was small enough to move around her fingers, giving Adam room to reign in his residue panic when she suddenly asked him, “Who’s your father, Adam?”

“...what?”

She repeated the question, as calmly as ever. Adam’s breaths were losing focus. “Can you tell me?”

“I don’t understand the question. Y-You should know, who he is. He-He died, that’s how we _met_. It’s why I’m _here_.” Adam swallowed down the sudden urge to puke. “ _Why_ are you asking me this?”

She smiled again. “Because we both know the real answer to it, don’t we?”

She set the clock down when Adam chose not to answer her.

He didn’t understand what was going on. His hands were starting to get sweaty. He’s lost control over the air coming into his lungs.

The clock kept ticking.

“Such a terrible emotion, sadness,” Adam watched her as her brows furrowed ever so gently, smile settling into a grim line as she folded her hands in her lap. “Grief. Sorrow. Horrible to feel, really. Makes most days unbearable, unreal, and I’ve seen how it looks on _so_ many faces, including yours. Though the circumstances are different, but you especially, Adam...” She leaned in, “You’ve been _so_ strong, you know that?”

Adam didn’t, but she had a way of saying it that almost made him believe her. Just a little bit. She sat back, sighing softly. “Well...I’d admit that listening to you this past year, I could never really imagine just how much more...impactful what had happened must’ve been for you. After all,” she sighed again. “...it’s the life you chose to have, and it didn’t end up the way you’d imagined it, did it? So long ago.”

“I’m fine with it.” Adam said, throat tight. “I chose to be human, that’s—“

“Your mistake, wasn’t it?”

Adam stopped breathing.

He watched her slowly stand up and pace towards his side. The shadows over her face deepening. “You’ve thought about it, haven’t you? You _knew_ ,” She put a hand over his shoulder, and it sagged under her touch. He started breathing again, focusing on the sound of her voice. He could only hear the sound of her voice. “That everything you’re feeling right now, it was never something I could help you with. Nothing any _human_ could ever help you with. _Because you’re special.”_

“I don’t _want_ to be.”

“But you _are_ ,”

Adam breathed.

“I’m not. Not anymore.”

Another hand found its way to his other shoulder, and her soft, gentle voice was now closer to his ear. “You couldn’t turn yourself into something you’re not Adam. You don’t get to choose that.” She patted his shoulder. “But you know what you _did_ do?” She patted him again, her voice going impossibly softer, almost like an echo within a room that wouldn’t stop stretching farther and farther.

“ _You chose to repress it_.”

“I...”

Another pat—the clock ticked.

He was gone.

_“That’s right, Adam.”_

The world faded in, and then out of him.

He can still hear her. Her voice grounded him, now. _“Listen to me. Feel yourself, beyond the sorrow, and the grief, and the anger.”_

He listened. He did.

_“Go deeper, beyond all those horrible emotions.”_

He felt. And it swarmed him, all at once.

The pain of hearing the deafening beep of a heart monitor flat lining.

The betrayal of being alone because no one was left in Tadfield to understand.

The resentment of change, of time, of a life he thought he’d get to keep forever.

The memory of a summer that never should’ve ended.

He hated it.

He hated it all.

“ _Feel them, Adam.”_

He did.

 _“It’s truly terrible, just_ excruciating _, being human...isn’t it?”_

_Yes._

_“You’re on top of all of it, Adam. You can stop from feeling it all.”_ He can almost hear her smile. _“You just have to be your true self.”_

_True self._

_“Look deeper, Adam. You can find it.”_

_True self._

_“You will find it.”_

_True self._

_“You will, because you never really changed.”_

Somewhere, outside of himself, a clock stopped ticking.

\--

_Everything’s fine_ , thought Crowley, consciousness slowly ebbing its way into him as he opened his eyes to the sun.

Of course, the bloody _sun_. Shitty star, that one. Good for basking while he laid on rocks, but why did it have to _be so fucking bright_?

He groaned, sluggishly throwing an arm over his face while feeling up beside him for his glasses, scratching and scraping through the sand. He heard a seagull yap somewhere above him, passing by with the wind, sending the hairs on Crowley’s exposed skin standing on end. His fingers caught on the temples of his eye wear, eventually, nearly poking his eye out as he tried to put it on.

Crowley squinted at the watch on his wrist just as he pulled away. A day has passed. Oh. Great. He’d slept exactly twenty four hours—the first since eight fucking years.

He plopped his arms back at his sides, and before he could start to consider making wings out of the sand, he looked up and paused.

It’s easier to look at the sky this time, Crowley seeing the clear azure color spreading as far as his eyes could see between the rims of his glasses. He stared at the vastness, flicking his tongue out for a quick taste of the salty air, tuning out the heat on his skin and the sound of the waves splashing against the shore nearby.

And when the familiarity of where exactly Crowley had seen this particular shade of blue before started to sink in, he mentally cursed himself. He groaned again, louder and with more fervor.

He abruptly stood up on his bare feet( _beach, bare feet, a church_ —he did a mental equivalent of slapping himself on the face), welcoming the static that crashed through his brain from standing up too quickly, and decided to distract himself further by looking around.

Crowley went lost in thought a little, snorting to himself. That’s what he’s been doing for the past eight years, isn’t it? Distracting himself. Couldn’t just sleep off another century like he’d always done when he felt particularly sorry for himself. The Not-pocalypse certainly helped with that—making Crowley realize he couldn’t just waste the rest of his immortal life on Earth sleeping on humanity now that he’d had a taste of losing all of it. Though perhaps it’s made him a little too mad, because even after everything, he still went _too bloody fast_ —

 _Perish the thought_ , Crowley chastised himself, as he did quite often now. Distraction. Right. Now that he really thought about it, he hasn’t even been sober for the last five has he? It kind of is about time he’s passed out in the middle of nowhere.

Speaking of nowhere, Crowley did finally look around then, finding nothing but white sand stretching away from the ocean for miles before disappearing into a hazy outline of tropical trees and wildlife. No footprints. _Bloody hell?_ He looked down at himself, now fully noticing that he was wearing nothing but a jet black speedo and a gold ankle bracelet. Crowley tried to remember how the hell he ended up here, scavenging his head for any memory of the night before, coming up blank. He tries before that, finding that the days(years) he’s spent indulging in his glorious attempt at retirement just all blurring together into one big pile of mush.

He should’ve just slept.

Forever.

_(A favor. A piece of paper, burnt on the surface of the water.)_

_(Fraternizing.)_

...right.

Crowley, after a moment of quiet misery, languidly started making the trek back to civilization. He walked with a slight crunch to his step, thankfully dry enough that the sand didn’t stick to his heels. The thought had him considering if he should miracle himself clothed before dismissing it, not wanting to bring attention from whoever’s still tallying him downstairs to himself while he was alone. The sun’s beating down on him enough not to need it anyway—he’s probably somewhere down the coasts of Asia if the air could stand to be this fucking hot. He watched his steps as he went, refusing to look up at the sky again.

 _You can’t run away from him forever_ , the voice of a bloke—some bar somewhere in Spain who Crowley made the mistake of dumping his emotional baggage on in the earlier days after he’d flew from London—repeated itself in his head. And like all the times he’d heard it without the moral support of particularly strong alcohol to make it bugger off, Crowley ignored it.

Except a shadow zoomed past his line of vision, and when he looked up and back in front of him he immediately halt to a stop with an unholy screech to the heavens. “ _Satan’s—_!”

“Hail Satan.”

The blatantly hideous floating demon head said with a voice(with a pitch only animals and demons could hear), taking his outburst for a greeting.

Fucking _Christ_. Crowley hasn’t seen this rubbish since the last time Hell had used it to relay instructions straight to him if he hadn’t had the time to go downstairs himself—back when the invention of the written word hadn’t been implemented in order to preserve Hell’s resources (utter bullocks, but if there’s one thing Crowley’s good at it’s pitching ideas and making it sound smart if not evil enough.)

It’s blank white eyes rolled around in its sockets, bobbing up and down in the air. Crowley brought his arms down to cover himself up with a repulsed shiver.

“Uh. Speak.”

“A message for the Demon Crowley!” It announced, it’s tongue lolling out between its decayed teeth. “Reputable Serpent of Eden, Traitor of Hell,” The unsightly thing paused, as if lagging to process what Crowley’s sure wasn’t very many titles, “...Twat.”

Ah. How creative.

“Alright. Sender?“

“From the Dark Lord Himself. Hail Him. Marked as letter of extreme urgency.”

Crowley blinked behind his glasses. “Huh.” Strange. What would Satan want to do with him? He hadn’t seen or heard from him since—well, the end. Or what could’ve been the end. He didn’t see what he’d want to do with Crowley after that whole debacle, if he even remembered it. It’s honestly one of the perks he’d had for not bringing his Bentley with him—dear old Luci loved contacting him through the golden voice of Freddie Mercury.

 _Urgent, too_. As if Satan cared about urgency enough not to take eleven years to berate his son for not ending the world after leaving him to be attended by a low level demon like Crowley. A plus parenting, Satan has.

But that no longer matters, does it?

“Message to be played now...” The head made a distinct gurgling sound that could almost be something akin to a computer malfunctioning, and the voice that came out a few moments later rooted Crowley to the spot. Definitely not Freddie Mercury’s voice, no. His real voice.

 _“CROWLEY.”_ He greeted, with a tone that wanted anything to do but _. “HARD TO GET A HOLD OF YOU THESE DAYS.”_

Crowley swallowed, thinking of his Bentley.

 _“YOU ARE A TRAITOR.”_ Yes. Big news, that. _“AND A TWAT.”_

“...are you sure that’s Satan?”

He rolled his eyes at himself for replying to something obviously pre-recorded, when Satan’s voice came through again. _“I BELIEVE YOU’VE WARNED US NOT TO TRIFLE WITH YOU ANY LONGER, GIVEN YOUR...APPARENT IMMUNITY.”_ ( _You can’t run_ —Another mental slap. He’s not getting any better at this.) _“BUT I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE FITTING TO TELL YOU MYSELF, AS YOU ARE NO LONGER WELCOME TO SERVE ME, OR TAKE PART IN THE DAYS TO COME WITH OUR SIDE. NONETHELESS, YOU SHOULD PREPARE YOURSELF.”_

Crowley stiffened. “What?”

 _“PREPARE YOURSELF, CROWLEY, BECAUSE I FEEL HIM.”_ The mouth on the head twisted up in a smile, and that somehow disgusted Crowley more than he already thought possible. _“MY SON IS BACK.”_

Crowley had half a brain to ask _what_ again, if he didn’t feel the blood all over his corporation go cold at those words. His son? He doesn’t have a son anymore. Unless—

 _Adam_.

“But—no, that’s impossible, he’s human now! He made it happen, he made you disappear, he’s—“

 _“—NOT ELEVEN YEARS OLD, ANYMORE_.” Crowley scowled at the blasted head, wondering how vengeful Hell’s post office would be if he decided to rough this one up a little(at least, more than it already looks). _“HE HAS GROWN, NOW_ MUCH _BETTER SUITED FOR HIS POWER, AND THIS TIME,”_ The sick smile on it grew impossibly wider, and it sent another chill down his spine knowing that that’s supposed to embody _Satan’s bloody smile_.

“ _YOU AND THAT PATHETIC EXCUSE OF AN ANGEL WON’T BE STOPPING HIM.”_

The heart of his traitorous corporation stopped beating in his chest.

The head shut it’s mouth, gurgled again, back to it’s nightmarish interpretation of a voice.

“Message relayed. Have a horrible day!”

“Oh no you don’t,” Crowley snapped his hand forward and barely caught the thing by it’s hair before it could manage to zoom back downstairs. He gripped tightly and shoved it back, holding it up in front of him and shutting his sense of smell so he could bear to hold a conversation with it. “You won’t even grace me with the favor of replying to your Lord?”

 _Your Lord_ , because Crowley didn’t serve Him anymore. He worked for _no one_ ; not Hell, definitely not Heaven. He’s just an old retired demon—and loyal to no one.

_“Our side.”_

_No one_ , Crowley’s inner voice repeated.

“This message was to be the last of all future correspondence.” Before Crowley could ask what that was supposed to mean, the head gurgled on. “We are preparing for war.”

 _There it is_. Crowley felt the familiar lilt of dread settling into the depths of his essence, just as strong as when he first felt it the moment the antichrist was handed to him in a basket. The head’s eyes kept rolling, tongue lolling, and voice high as it told him.

“The end is nigh.”

\--

_“Can anybody, find me, somebody to love?”_

_Everything’s fine_ , thought Aziraphale, as he woke up to the sound of the phone’s alarm belting off its _blasted bebop_.

_“Each morning I get up I die a little—“_

He reached a hand out to beat the phone off the nightstand, feeling the bone-deep satisfaction at getting rid of the thing for a _good_ millisecond, before immediately jolting himself awake and clambering out of the blankets to miracle it cushioned before it crashed to the no-carpet floors.

The silent thump that Aziraphale managed to hear over the still blaring contraption indicated it was unharmed, pushing a sigh of relief out of him, succeeded by a frustrated huff. 

_“—ve spent all my years in believing you, but I just can’t get no relief, Lord!”_

Aziraphale breathed the rest of his adrenaline rush out, releasing it all with one big sigh. The phone begged to have somebody to love one more time before stopping altogether, no doubt snoozed and ready to yell again in the next ten minutes—something he had to learn the hard way, eight years ago.

 _Ah_. He deflated, finding himself very much wanting to go back to sleep. _It has been quite a while, hasn’t it?_

He considered flopping back on the blankets and curling back into his ball of self-pity, as he found to be more and more tempting with each passing day, and fought against it. He forced himself to stand up and start his day. Sleeping really was such a dreadful thing, taking up so much of his time for no good reason other than to place him in a state of oblivion that could’ve been used for something more productive. Or at least that’s what he’d always believed; having only partaken in it when he’d performed a particularly strenuous miracle or passed out before being able to sober himself. Once he’d started it, more regularly these past years, he couldn’t really go without it any longer.

It was so much easier to feel tired when he felt emotions he would rather not feel.

_Is this what it was like, for him?_

Aziraphale pushed the thought away. Instead, he turned and started to make the bed, patting over the soft black pillows and settling them after spreading his hands over the equally dark silk sheets to smoothen them. Pulling at the edges of the blankets to lose any more glaring crinkles, he proceeded to retrieve the phone back from where it sat on the pillow he’d miracled on the floor. He stared back down at his own face when the screen lit up, grinning, holding up a wine glass to nothing in particular. As many times as he’d seen this now, he still couldn’t entirely place when it happened.

(He does, however, remember the sly smile on the demon as he took this image, and Aziraphale remembered being more drunk on it than he ever had the wine.)

(It might have been the last time he’d seen him smile, too.)

The song started again, and this time he didn’t waste a second in pressing it to stop. It was at times like these Aziraphale wished he could access the annoying piece of technology just to turn the alarms off. Not that he hasn’t tried—he just didn’t know what the four numbered pass code was, and it was also protected by a miracle of blatant demonic essence that Aziraphale couldn’t get past.

He felt that same demonic essence now, tingly around his fingers, and tucked it inside the pocket of his trousers. He looked at himself in the body mirror opposite the bed, at his growing hair and beard. He wore the same clothes, his suit jacket still on and everything, and he only bothered to miracle the wrinkles away before moving on.

The plants regarded him with subtle shakes of leaves after picking up the mister from the study. “Good morning loves.” He greeted, hoping his voice sounded as warm as he wanted it to. “Beautiful, you all are, really,” He cooed, raising a hand to caress each and every one of them after their weekly dose of hydration. He smiled thinly, as he stroked a finger on the last plant’s leaf. “He took such good care of you all, didn’t he?”

Aziraphale felt rather than saw each plant in the room slump down the slightest bit. He smiled at them sympathetically and moved on.

The lounge area was getting quite dusty, so he made a quick miracle of it before picking up the books he’d left cluttered all over the sleek modern sofa from last night and arranged them more neatly by the coffee table. He hadn’t been able to finish them yet, or any other book, for that matter. He hadn’t always paused from reading in order to get some shuteye but it was a common occurrence now, and the next time he was awake he always found himself reading something else and then not finishing that too. Constantly moving on, moving forward.

It’s taking him a bit of a while, but he believes he’s starting to get good at this moving on business.

He felt for the tingle the little contraption in his trouser continued to radiate, allowing himself this, at least. It’s more than he deserves, but it’s enough to know he’s alive. He could already hear a little rain pattering against the windows, and took it as his cue to leave.

“You’re up early today, dear. Good morning,” Hana greeted on him as he passed her on the way down. Her long hair now painted white cascaded down her frail shoulders, and she had a warm smile on her aging face as always. Aziraphale actually had to make the effort to smile this time.

“Yes, good morning to you too Mrs. Thorne,”

“You’re not taking the day off? It’s Sunday,”

“Ah, yes. I’m afraid I’ve just been keeping the bookshop rather busy these days.” Aziraphale cringed inwardly at how that had never, ever been true before, but now found it was anything but. He _had_ been keeping busy at the shop, and he’d been letting go of a lot of good books that years ago he would’ve traded the most precious thing in the world to him before he’d give them away to humans. Not that there’s really anything to trade now. “I’ve always felt more at home, there.” His hand subconsciously stooped down to pat at his pocket.

“Oh, yes. Understandable,” Hana hummed, looking at something behind her door frame before glancing at him again. “I do wonder when Anthony’s coming back from, where was it you said? America? Well, wherever he is I’m sure he would’ve loved to see how his plants are growing nicely on my terrace. You two should join me for dinner when he comes back,”

Aziraphale’s smile was starting to feel heavier. “Yes, um, that would be lovely. I-I’ll tell him you said hi.”

Her eyes twinkled as she smiled at him again. Aziraphale made sure she’d find one or two texts from her sons when she next checked her phone. “Well, don’t let me keep you. Ta.”

He let the rain fall on him when he stepped outside. Hana was right—it was early enough that the smell of pollution and the hordes of vehicles still haven’t graced the roads of central London with their presence. Miraculously, he stayed dry as he opted to walk the distance from Mayfair to Soho. The Bentley stayed parked across the road, and he left behind a little miracle to keep it clean and untouched too.

The walk was the most bearable part of the day.

It was easier to breathe, stepping through the streets of London, blending in with the humans slowly trickling from out of their homes to take their place in the morning’s rush hour. It was the same scene every morning and yet, different. Nothing was truly constant; new faces always mix their way into the crowds, an establishment or two closing down, a new one taking residence, even the seemingly stagnant state of humidity in the London air not sticking to a particular level of intensity. It wasn’t the bookshop, where he could breathe in nothing but dust and the memories spent in the backroom. It wasn’t the little Mayfair flat, where the scent of its owner disintegrated into nothing with each passing day. Here, he was weightless. Alone, but not lonely, in the ever-changing world—like he could actually move on. Move forward.

( _“Funny if we both got it wrong, eh?”_ )

Someday.

The rain had started to fall a little harder by the time Aziraphale walked up to stand in front of the bookshop. As distracted as he’d been he’d failed to keep up his drying miracle, and now everything from his hair down to his shoes were well on their way to getting well and truly soaked.

“Oh, bugger.” He cursed, as his hurried fumbling for the keys in his coat resulted in him dropping it to the already wet pavement. He huffed in irritation and bent to pick it up.

Suddenly, he couldn’t feel the rain tapping at his back anymore.

“Hello, angel.”

 _Not him_. Aziraphale knew that, the voice was too different.

Still, something inside him ran cold.

He looked up to a woman standing over him, holding an umbrella over his hunched figure. There was a hint of a smile on her lips, and Aziraphale _knew_.

She wasn’t human.

“I’m sure you have questions,” she said, and someone else stepped in from behind her. A man, taller and with deep, grey eyes. There was a soft glow around him, something Aziraphale himself had since the day he was created—but brighter. Holier.

His eyes widened. The woman just smiled. A sharp look he’d only ever seen on one other being.

“Care to invite us in?”


End file.
